


the rules we live by

by navaan



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Character Study, Community: wintercompanion, Ficlet, Introspection, Kissing, Loss, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-01
Updated: 2013-02-01
Packaged: 2017-11-27 19:42:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/665717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/navaan/pseuds/navaan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor breaks the rules. Sometimes even his own. Sometimes the results are worth it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the rules we live by

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for the [](http://wintercompanion.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://wintercompanion.livejournal.com/)**wintercompanion**   challenge “law”
> 
> [ **Original entry @ wintercompanion**](http://wintercompanion.livejournal.com/196988.html)

He spends his first lifetime much like other Time Lords. Of course, he breaks the rules even then sometimes, trying to break out of the stuffy cage that is everybody's life in the Citadel. His family watches, approves and disapproves, but never brings him back in line the way his teachers would prefer. It's the one thing he will never stop being thankful for.

They know he's brilliant and could have an equally brilliant future, but he's too much of a dreamer to be happy with the prospect. So they let him choose his own path.

His first life burns away slowly when one day he meets his destiny in the form of an old Type 40 and his real life begins.

It's not the first time he breaks the rules, but it's the first time he actually breaks a law.

 

 

The universe is his playground now.

Sometimes he admits it to himself. Sometimes he will vehemently deny it.

But the Tardis knows it's true and brings him to the places where he's most need – and sometimes to the places he most needs. Adventures find him, _because_ he doesn't go looking for them, although he needs them.

Sometimes that doesn't make sense even to himself.

 

 

One of the laws of this new life he's made for himself is this: Everything changes. Even the Doctor. Everybody leaves. Even if they don't want to. His life is complicated, out of sequence, ever changing and always new and always old, full of surprised and boredom, discovery and knowledge and happiness and pain.

In the end he'll be alone with his Tardis, running on, never stopping and never looking back.

 

 

He has never once seriously thought about permanently returning home to Gallifrey. He feels at home in the Tardis, feels he belongs wherever she's taking him.

But then the unthinkable happens and Gallifrey is lost. Gone. Locked away in time. Unreachable.

And he's the one who did it. Had to do it.

He didn't break any rules this time. Instead he'd only tried to save everyone else, the universe and time itself. But his home is lost and so are the Time Lords.

Once again the Doctor saved the universe. But this time he's lost the home he'd been running from for so long. It is different running from a home that isn't there anymore.

He's been lonely before, always feeling better with company, but he has never been this alone. Now he's the last of his kind - and a new life has just begun.

 

 

“You're an impossible thing,” he says, starring at Jack over the console of the Tardis. They've survived the Master's madness together, living a paradox for a year and now the Doctor has time to ponder how lonely it has been to be the last of his kind for so long – and how lonely it is to be the last of his kind once again.

Jack shrugs and then turns on the charm, grinning happily. “You've said that before. I've been pretty unique even before all this, you know?”

He doesn't even raise an eyebrow at Jack's comment, just keeps starring at him blankly. If the Time Lords of Gallifrey were still around, the Council would have seen to it that this anomaly would be fixed, even if that meant Jack wouldn't survive it. The way time moves around Jack is just too unnatural and strange. So strange that it has been hard for the Doctor to even face him for a time. But after all that has happened he finds that looking at Jack now doesn't scare him at all.

There are no Time Lords left but him and he makes the rules now.

“Gallifreyan law would not have allowed this to continue. But there's only me left and alone I can't do anything about it. I'm so sorry, Jack.”

A dark emotion passes through Jack's eyes, but is gone before the Doctor can be sure what it is exactly. “There are worse things than to go on living,” Jack says and chuckles.

The Doctor gives him a tired smile.

They both know that living too long can be a two edged sword sometimes.

 

 

He tries to bend the laws of time and gets burned.

Sometimes even he can't outrun what's coming for him.

Not knowing if there will be another he clings to this life and runs anyway.

 

 

Years later – it doesn't really matter if it's a few decades or a few centuries – he feels a familiar strangeness. He looks up and sees Jack - same roguish smile, same anachronistic coat –, watching him. He looks pointedly at the Tardis and then back at Jack's eyes, raising an eyebrow.

He's another man, but Jack is till the same. And Jack still sees the Doctor, whatever he looks like, whoever he has become.

This is a different life, so he can safely break some of the laws he has lived by, the rules he has set for himself and others.

He steps towards Jack and kisses him, impulsive and just a little too fast. But this is still Jack Harkness, who catches up quickly and grasps his hips hard, pulling him closer, deepening the kiss.

“That was an interesting way to greet a friend. Coming from you, I mean,” Jack says later, when they're sitting on the floor of the Tardis console room, both a little breathless and disheveled.

“It was time to break my own rules,” he says with a smile.

 

 

Now there is only one law left that he counts on.

He never has to be alone.

Because Jack will forever be out there.

Not waiting, but living.

He feels a little less lonely for it.


End file.
